Replicated Heart
by TheDarkestZero
Summary: "What happens when a fake dies? One like me…where will my heart go? Does it disappear? Tch…a faithful replica, to the very end." A replica who goes by the name of Riku finds light once again after his supposed death. And now he meets with the one person who had created him. Or rather, his creator's true self. Even. Two-Shot.
1. Shrouded in Darkness

**"****Hmph… Death doesn't frighten me. Good riddance to a phony life. My heart was…never real. I'm sure, even what I'm feeling now, is probably all fake. What happens when a fake dies? One like me…where will my heart go? Does it disappear? Tch…a faithful replica, to the very end. That's…okay." **

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**Chapter 1: Shrouded in Darkness**

I couldn't remember how far I've walked. For hours? Days? Perhaps years? What did it even matter? I didn't deserve a life. I could barely remember the little things about me. The name Riku stuck in my mind, and I could remember that I was _fake_.

I was all alone in this dark expanse. Where was I, I wondered. How did I even end up here? I would've gone mad, if it weren't for the first sign of life I actually saw.

She was sitting along a beach with dark waves lapping against the shore. A shining moon lay over the horizon. The girl I saw was sitting on a rock, staring out into the open dark sea. Where was this place?

I approached the girl calmly and without even looking back she muttered, "A beautiful place for such a realm crawling with evil entities. Right?"

"Yes," I said, the sound of my voice startling me. "Who are you?"

"My name is Aqua," she said, still staring off into space. She had kind of short blue hair, and I saw that she had crystal blue eyes. "It has been over ten years since last I saw the light of day. This place is the true darkness hidden from the light. And monsters live here…dark creatures that feed off of hearts. Every day I have to fight them just to stay alive, but I can always come back to this beach and hope for the best."

"Hope for the best," I repeated.

"So tell me, who are you?"

"My name is…" I thought back to the only name that stuck in my mind since I've been here. "…Riku."

Aqua let out a silent gasp as she raised her hand over her mouth. She turned her head towards me in disbelief, and a single tear rolled down her cheek. "Riku…you're Sora's friend?"

"…Sora…?" The name didn't sound familiar. "I don't remember the name…"

"So you can't remember," Aqua sighed. "You're the second here who's lost everything. His memories, his friends, his home…"

"Who would the first be?"

"I have hope that I can return," Aqua said with a sad smile. "But the man here who also visits by this beach has lost everything. He's been here twice."

"The only thing I can remember," I muttered, staring off at the horizon. "Is that I'm a replica. I'm fake. I'm not supposed to exist."

"A replica?"

"Correct," I replied. It was then that memories started flooding back, as she said the word 'replica'. I wasn't sure what was happening, but my head started hurting. And within seconds, all the pain was gone. "I just remembered…there was a castle…of white. There I met Sora. And I met…myself?"

"Wait…" Aqua interrupted me. "A castle of white? And you _met_ Sora? And yourself? What does that mean?"

"It means I'm not real."

"You don't remember the Destiny Islands?"

Something inside me snapped. I couldn't bare holding in all my emotions that I didn't yet know I had. So I stared at her in the eyes, and yelled, "They're all false memories! As long as I remain a replica, I'll never be more than a shadow!"

A sword, which I remembered was called the Soul Eater, appeared in my hand, and I slashed it through the air, making Aqua jump backwards.

"Such…darkness…" Aqua muttered, backing away more until her feet were in the water. In her hand appeared a _Keyblade._ The normal yellow outfit the _real _Riku wore that I also wore was engulfed in darkness and transformed into the black, red, and purple outfit of my darker form. "Who are you?"

"I am a replica of Riku created by Vexen!" I finally remembered, shouting it out at Aqua who got into a battle stance. "Vexen…he's dead. Killed by…Axel. Axel made me kill Zexion. I remember it all! And then…I was killed by Riku. _He_ did this!"

"You don't want to fight me!" Aqua shouted at me, but my rage was overflowing. "I'm your friend!"

"Replicas don't _have _friends!" I screamed at her, and ran at her with my Soul Eater outstretched. I swung it, and she jumped over it, and seemed to hover in the air a bit.

While she hovered, she yelled, "Crystal!" An orb of light appeared at the tip of her Keyblade, and it started expanding as it blasted off and fired towards me. I slashed at it with my Soul Eater, but on impact the crystal orb exploded, and a flurry of ice and crystal shattered and spread around my feet.

Aqua finally landed, pointing her Keyblade at me. I swung my Soul Eater at her, screaming "Dark Firaga!" and a red fireball with black darkness swirling around it formed at the tip of the Soul Eater, then shot her way.

He raised her Keyblade in the air as a glass-looking force field with purple colored hexagons surrounding it appeared around her, protecting her from the blast.

"Riku, listen to reason!" she shouted, startling me and making me snap back in reality. My anger subsided. "I know there's goodness and light within that darkened heart…you just have to look deep inside yourself, and maybe, just maybe, you can finally be free of this awful burden."

"The only way to stop this burden is by getting rid of the real Riku," I said, finally realizing my destiny. "I won't be a replica if Riku dies. I have to kill him."

"You can't!" Aqua yelled at me. "A long while back, I met Riku and Sora…they were so young, I had no idea that they'd be the ones to save the worlds from falling into evil's hands. Twice, in fact. The point is, you've got to lead your own life. You're still alive because fate had planned it."

"You believe in fate?" I asked her. "I'm a replica. I'm not even supposed to 'be' in the first place."

"Tell me about your creation," Aqua suggested, looking into my eyes and walking towards me, placing a hand on my shoulder. "How did you come to 'be'?"

"A member of that Organization," I answered. "Vexen had this replica project…a Program to copy one's data and genetic makeup to create an exact replica. I was created, but I didn't have Riku's memories. I knew I was a replica. Vexen had me face Sora and Riku separately within Castle Oblivion, and things happened, and I forgot about being a replica…they made me think I _was _Riku. Eventually my creator died, and this guy Axel made me kill this other guy…and then I faced off against Riku. And he beat me in a battle. And I vanished. I then ended up here."

"So you're not dead," Aqua muttered to herself. "So where could you go? Your destiny might not be over. You might be able to leave this foul place!"

"How can I leave?" I asked. "I'm here, a Replica, in this realm of evil. How is one like me…supposed to escape?"

The moon over the horizon seemed to glow ever brighter. A little too bright. I couldn't see anything, as the light was blinding.

"It's coming for you!" I heard Aqua yell over the roar of the light. "Don't be afraid! Be strong and the light will take you somewhere special! I just know it!"

I started walking forward, my feet entering the water. I kept walking through the light until I was knee-deep in water. For an odd reason I felt something slithering past my foot. I decided not to let it bother me.

The light was completely overtaking me. I couldn't hear anything at all. The light started to die down, and I couldn't see anything. Where was I?

_**Did you like the first chapter to my POSSIBLY three-chapter long story about Repliku? Leave a review please! I don't plan to make this into a long story, but I wanted to extend the replica's story just a little bit. So...where is this light taking him? REVIEW!**


	2. Shadows of Twilight

**Chapter 2: Shadows of Twilight**

I opened my eyes. After that bright light in that mysterious realm, I thought I'd at least be blinded. The darkness from that realm and the light from that mysterious gateway had faded away and were replaced by twilight.

I stood up, in front of a gate that would open up to a large mansion. I stood up on the grass, my feet no longer wet from the water. I recognized this place from Castle Oblivion. Vexen had called it Twilight Town.

Not even two minutes since I was there, and something was already going bad. A shadow slipped past my feet and sunk into the ground, and then reappeared right to the side of me. I turned towards it, and it was gone. Then it flashed right by my face, its golden eyes the only visible feature on the dark creature.

It then circled around me, my hair flying about in the generated wind that was created by it. I felt a sharp pain in my left leg, and I looked down and saw a gash at the bottom of the back of my left leg, where blood was leaking out and staining the grass.

My dark suit became my normal yellow one, and I fell over in pain as another sharp pain feeling like a dagger entered my stomach, and I coughed up blood. What was this? Replicas couldn't bleed. They weren't even real humans!

I tried to stand up, but I was caught in the stomach by yet another sharp object. When I finally caught glimpse of it, even though it was moving at an unimaginable speed, I saw it looked like Sora's body, but it was completely blackened save for its eyes.

It vanished quickly and reappeared right above me, and it slashed its hands rapidly, its sharp dagger-like nails digging into my skull.

I held my hand down on the back of my head, and I brought it to the front of my face and saw the bright red blood on my hand and fingers.

The Soul Eater materialized in my hand and I swung at it, but once the sword collided with the shadow, it slipped through it as if it was water.

The shadowy creature dropped to the ground and landed on its feet. Almost looking exactly like Sora, save for the way it looked at me was with wild animal's eyes. This thing was pure evil.

And then it hit me. In the water within that dark realm, I had felt the slithering of something by my foot in the water. Was this it? Did I release this thing? Was it even supposed to be here?

"What are you?" I ask.

I couldn't hear a reply. When the creature spoke, it sounded like a thousand daggers slicing against one another mixed in with a dozen snakes.

After what seemed like an eternal staring contest, the dark version of Sora vanished into thin air.

"What was that?" I asked myself, and I heard footsteps behind me. I whipped around and saw a teen with dirty blonde hair that had an odd slicked back style to it. "Who are you?"

"Hayner," the kid replied, and then looked at me. "You a friend of Sora's? Because you're definitely not from around here."

"I guess you could say that," I replied quickly. I made my Soul Eater vanish.

"Yep, that sword proves it!" Hayner said with a smile. "So what brings you to these parts?"

I wanted to tell him 'a very vicious light that opens up within the dark realm' but of course I had to be realistic. "I'm traveling," I said. "I'm finding my destiny."

"That's cool, I guess," Hayner said without much of a smile. "So, since you're here, there must be something going on, right?"

"Something going on?" I repeated with confusion.

"So you're not here to take care of the ghost problem?" Hayner asked. "Then let me fill you in."

"Or I can, because you take way too long," a voice said from behind Hayner. A guy with spiked up black hair and a red shirt, this guy approached me and said, "A couple of days ago, these spiritual beings were spotted at Sunset Hill. The locals said they saw several people in hooded cloaks appearing and then vanishing just as quickly periodically until nightfall. So these can be ghosts."

"Or the Organization," I said quickly. "What would make you think that they're ghosts?"

"They appear out of thin air," Hayner said, crossing his arms and turning his back to me and the other kid. "Pence and I were just about to go there to check it out for ourselves. Whatever's going on, I'm sure it has something to do with the missing townsfolk."

"Missing?" I asked. "As in…they're not here anymore?"

"Listen, do you wanna help us or not?" Hayner asked me, and I nodded. "Then it's time to get going. In two hours it'll be dark."

…

I had followed Hayner and Pence through Twilight Town, despite my not knowing them, forgetting entirely about the blood stained on my shirt and the constant dripping of blood from my leg. These two sure knew their way around town.

Instead of taking the train to Sunset Hill as one would have to, they chose to go down into the maze of tunnels underneath Twilight Town, where they would eventually reach a set of gates. Once we were through, we were at a small town at the base of a huge hill.

As we walked up the spiraling walkway that led ourselves up the hill, we were getting farther and farther away from civilization. Apparently, as Pence explained to me while we climbed the hill, people were normally out and about all over this hill. But since these 'ghosts' started appearing, nobody had dared go up the hill for fear of their lives.

We had reached the very top, where a small brown puppy was running straight from the other edge of the hill, soon running and brushing passed my legs.

"Something spooked it," Pence told us.

"I'm guessing _that_," Hayner said in a somewhat alarming tone.

I looked ahead and saw that we were no longer alone on the hill's summit. A figure dressed in a black coat materialized before us, his back turned so he most likely didn't see us. I should have stayed quiet.

But my only instinct was to yell. "Organization scum!" Hayner and Pence backed away when I yelled that, my dark suit returning and dark tendrils rising up my legs and fist, as I called upon my Soul Eater.

The black hooded being that stood nothing but ten feet in front of us turned to look at me. It held its hand out, and appearing in it was an icy blue shield. A shield that was all too familiar.

I nearly dropped my Soul Eater. "…Vexen? Is that you?"

The figure's shield vanished in a flurry of ice and blue, and instead of attacking, the figure simply started chuckling. "So the Replica _is_ still alive, just as intended."

_Vexen's _voice. So it _was_ my master.

"Don't look at me like that," Vexen said. "Do I sound familiar? Don't worry; I'm not the real Vexen." He removed the hood and what I saw _was_ Vexen, but he had far longer hair and his eyes were more of a bluish color.

"What are you?" I asked.

"I am Vexen's thirty-second replica," the _not-Vexen_ said with a smile. What did that mean? Vexen's…_replica_…? "You see, before he created you and the other one, Xion, he created a vast number of replicas under his name. I believe there was ninety-nine. He created us, but every one of them ended in failure. None of them were completely identical. Some had longer hair, some were bald, some looked nothing like him…others looked like his original self before he became a _Nobody._"

So…does this mean I was a better Riku than all those other replicas were a Vexen? Who was the other one, Xion that he had mentioned? I needed more answers, but decided to stay quiet.

The replica continued, "To differentiate us replicas, even though we all looked different, he inscribed a number on our foreheads." He lifted up some of the hair that was in the way of his forehead, and carved into his head was the number _32_. "He thought replicas didn't feel pain, so he carved in our heads with a knife. Trust me, it was torture."

"I'm not really sure how you two know each other," Pence said after his and Hayner's long silence. "But I'm guessing you're not a ghost, Vexen?"

"A ghost? No, no, silly boy," the Vexen replica said between laughs. "We keep coming here for our project. A project based at this very hill."

"And the missing townsfolk?" Hayner spoke up.

"A minor setback for our project," the replica said, turning his smile into a frown. "We take away their hearts, casting their bodies into darkness, and with the hearts we're creating perfect replicas of the townspeople. We're extending far beyond Vexen's original intentions."

"Then who is…_we_?" I asked, still majorly confused.

"All of the replicas that Vexen has ever created," Number 32 said, beginning to laugh once more. He raised his arms into the air as many more figures in hooded black coats and suits appeared on the summit. He wasn't kidding when he said none were exactly like Vexen. There were tiny replicas and large replicas. None would show their face though.

Appearing in a flash of light was…the _real_ Vexen who now stood in front of me in a bright white lab coat. He looked at me and said, "Do not tango with these replicas. They only know destruction. They're trying to destroy this world by taking down the townspeople."

"Destruction?" I asked. "Who exactly are you? You don't…feel like Vexen. You have a different scent. One…not of darkness, but of light."

"The name's Even," the man before me spoke in a kind sounding voice. "I guess I am the creator of Vexen. His original self. Now, other two boys! Get off of this hill!"

Hayner and Pence took no time running down the hill for their lives. Even looked into my eyes, and I felt a rush of warmth overtake my body, and the two of us slipped away and vanished from the hill, leaving the many replicas of Vexen by themselves.


End file.
